“I’m here, miss,” replied Mr. Giles. “Don’t be frightened, miss; I ain’t much injured. He didn’t make a very desperate resistance, miss! I was soon too many for him.”
“Hush!” replied the young lady; “you frighten my aunt as much as the thieves did. Is the poor creature much hurt?”
“Wounded desperate, miss,” replied Giles, with indescribable complacency.
“He looks as if he was a-going, miss,” bawled Brittles, in the same manner as before. “Wouldn’t you like to come and look at him, miss, in case he should?”
“Hush, pray; there’s a good man!” rejoined the lady. “Wait quietly only one instant, while I speak to aunt.”
With a footstep as soft and gentle as the voice, the speaker tripped away. She soon returned, with the direction that the wounded person was to be carried, carefully, upstairs to Mr. Giles’s room; and that Brittles was to saddle the pony and betake himself instantly to Chertsey: from which place, he was to despatch, with all speed, a constable and doctor.
“But won’t you take one look at him, first, miss?” asked Mr. Giles, with as much pride as if Oliver were some bird of rare plumage, that he had skilfully brought down. “Not one little peep, miss?”
“Not now, for the world,” replied the young lady. “Poor fellow! Oh! treat him kindly, Giles for my sake!”
The old servant looked up at the speaker, as she turned away, with a glance as proud and admiring as if she had been his own child. Then, bending over Oliver, he helped to carry him upstairs, with the care and solicitude of a woman.